Germany’s coronavirus infections rise again just days after lockdown eased
New figures suggest the virus is spreading again, although officials stressed it's too early to tell for sure.
Coronavirus infections are on the rise in Germany again days after lockdown restrictions were eased, official data suggests.
The virus’ spread cannot be accurately tracked in real-time, so available data is used to estimate the number of people each confirmed patient infects, known as the reproduction rate.
A new report indicated the rate in Germany is now above 1, meaning the number of infections could be growing once more.
The news will fuel fears that the pandemic could slip out of control again just days after Germany began lifting restrictions.
Chancellor Angela Merkel announced on Wednesday that more shops could open and schools would gradually start to welcome pupils back.
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She also warned ‘emergency brake’ measures allow restrictions to be reimposed at short notice if infections pick up again.
Karl Lauterbach, an opposition MP and professor of epidemiology, warned the virus could start spreading again after seeing large crowds out in his home city of Cologne on Saturday.
He tweeted: ‘It has to be expected that the R rate will go over 1 and we will return to exponential growth. The loosening measures were far too poorly prepared.’
Thousands of Germans protested on Saturday in favour of a total end to the lockdown.
The Robert Koch Institute, the government agency responsible for disease control, stressed that its estimates are subject to uncertainty and said a ‘close monitoring of the situation’ was needed.
In a separate daily memo issued on Saturday evening it said: ‘It is too early to infer whether the number of new infections will continue to decrease as in the past weeks or increase again.’
The reproduction rate was estimated at 1.1, but the calculations’ margin of error means it could be between 0.90 and 1.34, the report added.
This means the figures could be a blip and the outbreak could prove to still be receding.
The ‘emergency brake’ includes a threshold of 50 cases per 100,000 people for reimposing restrictions in local districts.
This threshold has already been hit in two districts in the country, in one case following an outbreak among workers at a meat processing plant.
The plant in North Rhine-Westphalia was closed on Friday after more than 150 of its 1,200 workers tested positive. Many are EU migrant workers housed in shared quarters.
Germany has the seventh-highest number of confirmed cases in the world with Sunday’s official tally standing at 169,218.
Its reported death toll of 7,395 is significantly lower in proportion to the number of infections, which has been partly credited to early action to increase testing capacities.
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